Social Thinking® Methodology: Evidence-Based or Empirically Supported? A Response to Leaf et al. (2016)

Social Thinking Metacognitive Strategies to Support Self-Determined Social Goals in Autistic Youth

“…43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 The STM is one example of a social (meta)cognitive methodology developed for both neurodivergent and neurotypical social learners. 51 52 Founded 25+ years ago, the methodology is composed of evidence-informed and evidence-based concepts, frameworks, and strategies to support social attention, self-awareness, social metacognition, social communication, executive functioning, social and emotional awareness, social responsibility, and social competencies. 51 53 Unlike traditional behaviorally based social skill programs focusing on teaching social rules and social behaviors, the STM emphasizes (1) first understanding the individual's social learning characteristics, including their social desires or goals; (2) teaching aspects of how the social world works based on their goals; and (3) teaching strategies for navigating, using social cognitive self-regulation, to make gains toward one's goals.…”

“…51 52 Founded 25+ years ago, the methodology is composed of evidence-informed and evidence-based concepts, frameworks, and strategies to support social attention, self-awareness, social metacognition, social communication, executive functioning, social and emotional awareness, social responsibility, and social competencies. 51 53 Unlike traditional behaviorally based social skill programs focusing on teaching social rules and social behaviors, the STM emphasizes (1) first understanding the individual's social learning characteristics, including their social desires or goals; (2) teaching aspects of how the social world works based on their goals; and (3) teaching strategies for navigating, using social cognitive self-regulation, to make gains toward one's goals. It is important to acknowledge the emphasis on teaching social concepts about the social world or filling in knowledge gaps related to the individual's self-determined social goals before teaching strategies to navigate or self-regulate.…”

Clinical developmental, neuropsychological, and social–emotional features of Turner syndrome

“…Many of the evidence-based social skills curriculums developed for children and adolescents with high-functioning ASD may also be helpful to address some of the social difficulties in TS since they also often target areas such as emotion recognition and reading social cues, however research studies to validate these programs in TS are needed to determine if they are effective or require modifications for the TS population. Techniques such as The Hidden Curriculum by Brenda Smith Myles (Myles, Trautma, & Schelvan, 2013), Michelle Garcia Winner's extensive "Social Detective" work (Crooke & Winner, 2016;Winner, 2018), and strategies in the book "The Science of Making Friends", by Elizabeth Laugeson may be a good fit for often highly verbal girls with TS (Laugeson, 2013).…”

Addressing the Challenge of Verbal Irony: Getting Serious about Sarcasm Training

“…There is some evidence that social skills training can be effective for children with a diagnosis of ASD, in terms of improved general social competence (Chung et al 2007;Tse et al 2007;Williams White et al 2007). There are now numerous programs that are being used clinically to improve social skills in children with a diagnosis of ASD, and there is also some debate about the extent to which these are empirically supported and can be considered evidence-based interventions (e.g., Crooke and Winner 2016;Leaf et al 2016Leaf et al , 2018. However, to our knowledge, very few studies have specifically assessed the efficacy of irony training for individuals with ASD.…”